Neutral Female characters in Anime and Manga.
- Bleach plays with this trope:
- Orihime often sat on the sidelines until after the Time Skip because her pacifism made her a better healer than a fighter.
- Captain Unohana rarely fights because no one's brave enough to fight her. So she spends most of her time on the sidelines, advising and healing.
- Berserk:
- Justified with Casca post Golden Age. Any person regardless of gender would go insane after what she’s been through at the hands of Femto and the Apostles during the Eclipse (Guts only endures due to his colossal willpower), so her mental regression from Action Girl into the passive and child-like “Elaine” who just dimly watches the action unfold in front of her is totally acceptable. She does have moments of her old badass self but it takes a Trauma Button with some rapey bandits for her to start cutting heads’ off again. In the Fantasia arc Casca despite regaining her mind, is helpless and immobile when Moonlight Boy reverts into Griffith and after no-selling Guts’s attacks goes and captures Casca though in this case it’s simply that the pain of the Brand causes her to faint. Averted totally when we see Casca again in Falconia as she desperately tries to fight and escape back to Guts, taking on several guards as she does so. Though a "Groundhog Day" Loop from Griffith prevents her from actually escaping.
- Many other female characters such as Farnese are straighter examples such as Farnese who spends a lot fights in the series just standing back with a hand over a mouth watching Guts cutting shit up. This does get downplayed when she learns magic from Schierke allowing her to help out against monsters but otherwise she just babysits the regressed Casca. She was also a Faux Action Girl as leader of the Holy Iron Chain Knights, though it is explained she’s more of a figurehead and not actually expected to fight. Played With regarding other female characters such as Thersia and Jill while both are helpless in a fight being young girls, they still inadvertently help Guts by distracting both the Count and Rosine respectively with Guts taking full advantage of their Even Evil Has Loved Ones hesitation to pull off a sneak attack.
- Claymore: While Claire is an Action Girl now, she was like this back when she was just a child, often gasping in horror as her mentor, Teresa, fought off the bandits invading the village, and eventually her own fellow Claymores. Justified because she was just a small girl back then. Claymore also has a Gender Inverted for this trope as well: Raki. He often stood around, hoping that Claire would save him from the monsters attacking him. But in Volume 14, of the manga, he, just like Claire, became more than capable of holding out on his own, or to be more precise, chop Yoma into hunks of meat.
- Death Note has Misa in one scene hiding like a scared cat, while L and Light punch and kick each other.
- Dragon Ball:
- Averted by Videl in the tenth Dragon Ball Z movie Broly: The Second Coming. Broly is crushing the life out of Gohan, so Videl throws a crystal shard at him. He breaks it easily, but his concentration is broken long enough for Gohan to kick his way out of the stranglehold and start the Kamehameha Wave that (with help from Goten and Goku) does Broly in.
- Played straight in general with most of the female characters in the franchise with only a couple of exceptions such as Android 18.
- Bulma notably is always on the sidelines during battles and her number one greatest strategy when forced into action is to try and seduce the villain e.g General Blue and Zamasu — which worked exactly zero times. In Dragon Ball GT at least Bulma does actually contribute to Final Battle shooting Vegeta with a blutz wave cannon to help turn him into Super Saiyan 4.
- Chi-Chi is somewhat better at averting this as being a Fearless Fool she is often willingly to rush into battle for her family’s sake and in Dragon Ball Z: Lord Slug she helps Gohan in battle taking out two alien mooks though it is sadly short lived, as she’s quickly incapacitated by a third solider. At other times the good guys literally have to force Chi-Chi to be this, as she’ll be killed otherwise, as shown when Super Buu killed her for standing up to him. She also doesn’t like fighting in general despite her martial arts background and just wants to live a normal life.
- Launch thanks to her Split Personality both averts and plays this straight. In her blue haired nice form she’s completely this and just spectates the action with the only thing she’s done that actually benefits the story is giving Goku her energy in the Buu Saga. Averted with her bad girl blonde form who is a Badass Normal willingly to More Dakka enemies, beats the shit out of Red Ribbon Army mooks and even saves a stricken Kami’s life from Piccolo’s attack with a rough rescue
. Blonde Launch was a proto Z-era Chi-Chi in many ways as she’d try and get involved whenever she could but is never able to achieve much e.g she tries to attack Crane Hermit and Chiaotzu for their cheating in the Tien Saga but Shen gives her the Finger Poke of Doom. - Android 18 zigzags this. After being the high queen Action Girl in the Android Saga being the first person to defeat a Super Saiyan, she spends most of the Buu Saga on sidelines being now a wife and mother, she fights in the 25th World Martial Arts Tournament but only for the sake of getting rich. 18 fights again briefly in Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods but being up against Beerus loses like everyone else. In Dragon Ball Z: Resurrection 'F' 18 more egregious sits out of the action again while Krillin goes into battle despite the fact (as she points out) she’s far more powerful than him but Krillin rationalises the Stay in the Kitchen as someone needs to stay behind and protect Marron if all else fails. In Dragon Ball Super 18 spends most of the series on the sidelines until finally averting this for Tournament of Power, though worth noting 18 doesn’t see the point of fighting if there’s no cash prize and only after being explained it’s for the sake of the universe does she agree to kick ass again. Averted in Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero 18 fights Cell Max along with the boys without any prompting whatsoever, then again it is Cell which may explain it.
- While Videl as mentioned before does avert this in the Buu Saga era movies, in Dragon Ball Super however she is absolutely this and doesn’t fight once being now a Girly Girl who acts nonchalantly to even asshole Barry Kahn trying to blackmail Gohan. Averted in Dragon Ball GT as she does fight in the Baby Saga albeit when possessed and at least suits up as Great Saiyawoman again in the Super Android 17 saga though by the time she gets to the battleground Goku and 18 have already won.
- Gine Goku’s mother, unlike almost every other named female pure blooded Saiyan stays out of conflict and dislikes violence. Averted in Dragon Ball: Fusions though where Gine does fight as a Action Mom for Kid Goku’s sake.
- Fairy Tail:
- Eclair in the movie: The Phoenix Priestess. Justified in that she not only doesn't practice magic, she also hates it, but it's a little strange to see an example in an endless sea of Action Girls.
- Lucy herself does take an active role in most battles, but she filled this role during the fight with the Lullaby monster. In the anime version, Happy even made fun of this trope.Lucy: I hope [Natsu, Grey, and Erza] will beat that thing...
Happy: Shouldn't you help them out?
Lucy: Gee, I'd love to, but none of my Celestial Spirits are available right now, and I'd probably just get in the way.
Happy: That's no excuse. - Erza Scarlet herself even tries to Invert this trope at times. For example, at one point during Natsu's fight with Laxus, Erza punches Natsu in the stomach and attempts to take on Laxus herself.
- Haruhi Suzumiya: Mikuru Asahina fits this trope because she doesn't help in the fighting. This is because she's ordered to be neutral by her time-travelling superiors, namely her future self, which means the poor girl literally has herself to blame for her helplessness.
- If you’re a woman in Fist of the North Star expect to be either kidnapped or spend a lot of time watching the Rated M for Manly action take place as the World of Muscle Men fight over you. Yuria, Kenshiro’s love in particular might as well be the poster girl for this, she’s idolised by all three Hokuto brothers, Shin and Juza for being beautiful and kind. That’s it. Probably most painful is that the awesome Samus Is a Girl reveal of her the being the Last General of the Nanto Roku Seiken is immediately met with her getting captured by Raoh and just watching from the sidelines before dying. Her spin-off Yuria Gaiden at least gives her some more Reasonable Authority Figure moments in between all the usual Damsel in Distress. Averted with Mamyia though Overshadowed by Awesome and needing to be rescued unlike Yuria she does actually get involved in the action and is able to curb stomp mooks.
- Averted by Snow in the anime ending of MÄR. Ginta would not have been able to beat the Orb without her merging her soul with Koyuki, thus allowing him to use the stone that was trapped inside of her all her life.
- My-HiME has Yuuichi as an understandably neutral male when his super-powered best friend starts trying to kill his also super-powered love interest. He's not the only one, though: Mai's little brother Takumi also does that at least thrice And the third one happens just before he dies, when his tomboyish girlfriend Akira's CHILD is destroyed.
- Naruto:
- Sakura is infamous for spending most of the time in battle just standing with a kunai in a defensive position while her male teammates do all the actual fighting, despite that only happening twice (it made sense in the Bridge Builder arc because she was left as the only one actually guarding the person they were supposed to be guarding). If they had indicated that she's supposed to be a non-combatant, this would have been more acceptable, but the fact that she's supposed to be a highly trained ninja makes this all the more insulting. It isn't until the first arc after the Time Skip that she does anything else... until she gets shunted to the sidelines again as The Medic and doesn't harken part in any fights for about half of the series. It then gets subverted again in the Fourth Shinobi War Arc, when after perfecting one of Tsunade's best techniques she wreaks havoc among the Ten-Tails's clones — which impresses Sasuke but terrifies Naruto.
- A couple of girls in the series lapse into this at times, like in Team 10's fight against Kakuzu, where Ino's only contribution to the fight was locating him. By the Fourth Shinobi World War Arc, she makes up for it big time.
- Konan, who probably has the least screen-time out of all the members of Akatsuki, Averts this when she faces down Tobi and forces him to resort to a Dangerous Forbidden Technique in order to survive.
- A rough example in Neon Genesis Evangelion, during Episode 23: Rei Ayanami struggles with the Body Horror that is Armisael, and is losing. Misato deploys Asuka to assist her, but her EVA simply will not move. The show portrays Asuka's ability to combat effectively frequently enough in the previous episodes to justify her warrior status, but her history nearer the present fight with Armisael tears open very old psychological scars and cuts new ones even deeper. Asuka's shot pride is her only inhibitor: she cannot/will not help Rei. This inaction kills Rei.
- Shigure from Ninja Scroll (the series, not the movie) spends a fair amount of time standing around and watching while the villains massacre the people whose savior she's supposed to be. She then proceeds to angst about it: "They're all dead and it's all my fault!"
- One Piece
- A villainous example with Smoothie. Her demonstration of the trope is such that she quickly achieved memetic status. She is in the top 3 fighters in one of the 4 strongest pirate crews in the World and yet, when a coalition aiming to assassinate her captain (who's also her mother) bursts into and ruins the tea party, she basically just stands in the background and does nothing. Made even worse by many of her brothers who, despite having a lesser rank, actually show themselves far more useful than her. Worth noting Oda revealed he did actually want to do more with Smoothie but simply ran of time with Wano around the corner.
- Robin gets accused of this in the New World thanks to some mild Badass Decay that was only more recently rectified in Wano arc. Pre-Time Skip Robin could pretty much beat any foe short of the Arc Villain and was always joining Luffy, Zoro, Sanji and Franky in the ass whooping. In the New World however it becomes far common for Robin to spectate battles as Miss Exposition and only provide support with her Devil Fruit rather than actively engaging in one on one fights. In Dressrosa climax Robin just babysits Rebecca while the rest of the heroes fight. The movies are far worse however as Robin spends the majority of them needing to be rescued or carried around like luggage by Sanji, Brook, Franky and Law. At most she helps holds opponents still. Finally averted in Onigashima where Robin saves Sanji from Black Maria and delivers a glorious back break on the latter with her Next Tier Power-Up.
- Averted with Nami and Vivi while both much weaker than Robin and often need to be rescued from strong enemies and monsters, they do at least contribute to the action and plot in some way and almost never non-active ot passive. The only time Nami truly played this straight was in Thriller Bark during Sanji’s fight with Absalom and she was literally unconscious there.
- Usopp is a gender inverted example especially post time-skip as being Overshadowed by Awesome he spends more time running away and spectating than actually fighting. He does have some truly epic Cowardly Lion moments particularly pre-timeskip. Averted in One Piece Stampede where despite Big Bad Douglas Bullet (who’s as strong as Rayleigh) lampshading his uselessness and wondering why Luffy would have such a crewmate, Usopp actually helps Luffy take Bullet down in the climax.
- In Pokémon Adventures, during the first battle with N, Black yells at White to help him out as he's getting his ass kicked. She cries out that all her Pokemon aren't really hers, as they are actors from her talent agency, and that she has never been in a battle in her life. Black promptly goes into a hilarious Face Fault with the words, "Does not compute" over his head. Subverted with Diamond's mom in an earlier arc. When there's a Zubat threatening to slit her throat, she manages to squirt some berry juice in its face before hitting it with her basket.
- Zigzagged in Rave Master. Elie helps twice when Haru's in the middle of a fight, but one of those times was accidental, and she sat in the sidelines in some of his other battles. Subverted after she regains her memories as Resha.
- Anthy Himemiya from Revolutionary Girl Utena can be seen as this for roughly 90 to 95% of the series. In fact, the series could be seen to Deconstruct the trope that women ought to ultimately obey their 'prince' and have no life of their own. As punishment for being a witch, Anthy was cursed to be in the role of the Rose Bride, passed around from person to person based on the outcome of a duel. As Anthy saw herself as an empty shell with no heart, she went along submissively. Only when she became friends with Utena who encouraged her to obey her own will did she start to try doing what she wanted.
- Yumi Komagata from Rurouni Kenshin is one of these, which is something she hates about herself, as it means she's never useful to her lover Shishio whenever he's in combat. It's for this reason that she's actually happy when Shishio stabs through her in order to land a blow on Kenshin, as she sees it as the first time she's managed to assist him in battle.
- Sometimes in Sailor Moon. One of the cases was in the end of Season R. After main heroine Sailor Moon/Usagi managed to explain and convince Prince Demand (who was in love with her) that he had been manipulated by Wiseman, said character appeared to kill her. Demand started fighting him...and Usagi just stood there doing absolutely nothing. To top it off, Demand died in this battle when he stood in front of her to protect her from Wiseman's attack.
- Parodied in the first episode of Slayers, when Lina is attacked by bandits and Gourry comes to her aid. Lina is preparing to blast the bandits into oblivion, but then realizes that she's supposed to be all passive and distressed in these situations, and so she role-plays it for fun.
- Tokyo Mew Mew: In a very similar style to the Sailor Moon example above, this happened in the last battle, when Kishu fought Deep Blue and Ichigo just stood there watching. The manga shows that their fight wasn't as quick as in the anime.
- Zigzagged in Trigun with Meryl and Millie, they aren’t nearly as powerful or dangerous as Vash and Wolfwood and spend a lot more time being the comic relief spectators to the action than actually being a part of it. At best, they'll drop in at the last moment to comedically finish off an already-weakened enemy (at one point landing on top of one by accident and saving Wolfwood from a cheap shot). Interestingly, in Trigun Stampede, even though Millie has yet to be introduced and Meryl isn't armed at the start of the story, it's averted. Despite her inexperience Meryl will do whatever she can to help even if it means risking her life, to the despair of her cynical mentor (since he has to keep bailing her out of trouble). In the season finale, when Vash has lost everything and Wolfwood's abandoned him to suffer, Meryl won't give up. Her determination breaks through Vash's comatose state and allows him to seize control of his powers and fight back.
- Sakura of Tsubasa -RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE- is almost always this in the first season. She spends the first few episodes unconscious, and when she does awaken, she often wanders off in a semi-trance and needs to be saved. Justified, as it's not her fault (she has no memories), but there is one exception. In one world, she is kidnapped and locked away in a castle. Naturally, the guys launch a rescue attempt, but rather than sitting there waiting for them to show up, she resourcefully escapes from her cell, discovers the secret of the place, and has to rescue the rescuers using her often-neglected super power. But considering she is wandering around with three expert fighters, it's not surprising they don't need or expect her help in fights.
- The girls of YuYu Hakusho, barring Genkai, are this, more often than not because only Genkai has combat-related spiritual abilities. This is justified in the Dark Tournament arc; they're only at the tournament as spectators in the crowd and support for the Urameshi team.
